Comelec needs more protection from hackers, NSA officials say

The National Security Agency (NSA) on Friday reported that as much as P2.5 billion was needed to protect the poll automation computers from hackers and other would-be saboteurs of the 2010 elections.

“To assure that there is no interruption in the transmission of the election results until they reach [the] Commission on Elections [Comelec], we need to buy soft and hardware to locked the system and protect it from all kinds of interruption,” said agency Undersecretary Virtus Gil.

He added that it was imprudent to completely rely on Smartmatic, the winning project bidder that had boasted that its software and hardware completely secure from hackers.

“Suppose something happened during the election period,” Gil said in the weekly media forum, Balitaan sa Rembrandt, in Quezon City (Metro Manila). “What will we do to stop hackers? Remember that there would be 80,000 computers that would be used, and this means that there would be 80,000 persons involved in operating the [poll automation] machines.”

He said that P2.5 billion was actually a small amount compared to the ensuring the sanctity of votes in the first fully automated elections in the Philippines.

The National Security Agency had apparently conducted a study of the security issues related to next year’s polls, but it was unclear how the P2.5 billion was derived or to whom the report was done.

Possible problems

At the same media forum, Dante Mara of the Cyber Security Agency—also under the National Security Agency—noted that the Comelec may encounter a host of problems during the elections, including denials of service, power interruption and computer virus.

“Worse comes to worst, if a losing candidate wants to disrupt the ongoing counting, he might asked one of the computer technicians to inject a virus or other means of disruption like denial of service so that Comelec cannot receive data needed,” he said.

He added that some 8,000 poll-automation machines would be use at the provincial level, where vote counts would be relayed from cities and municipalities to the Comelec’s head office in Manila.

Mara echoed Gil’s concern, saying that to Comelec needed to buy additional computer-security software and gadgets that would allow the machines to run even electricity is cut.

Mara added that additional security software and hardware could also be of use after the elections—by government offices in need of protection from cyber crimes. –Sammy Martin, Reporter, Manila Times